Baron Briefs

… from 6 to 7%. Can i do better?” – a Baron Briefs reader

Your current Realtor is likely offsetting the additional costs she incurs in marketing expenditures and overall risk as homes sit on the market unsold. If you want to keep her as your Realtor, here are some suggestions for getting her back down to 6%:

1. Consider passing on expensive services that rarely sell homes such as newspaper advertisements and open houses
2. Offer a “tiered” commission. For example, at $200,000, agree she’ll be paid 6% on any dollar up to $200,000 and paid 10% on any dollar above $200,000.
3. If you’re moving within the same local market, ask her to represent you on your purchase, too. Typically, Realtors will reduce their commission by up to 33% if they have a hand in both transactions.
4. And finally, if all else fails, we obviously recommend using our own service to help find the most competitive sales commission in your area.

Anyone have additional tips?

There’s a been a media feeding-frenzy over foreclosure bus tours of late. Started by Stockton real estate agent, Cesar Dias, foreclosure bus tours have spread across the country….including the Dallas-Fort Worth area which, to my knowledge, doesn’t have a high foreclosure rate but whatever brings in clients, right?

Now, the Sac Bee is reporting on Stockton’s next foreclosure start-up, the Greener Grass Co:

Owner Nick Terlouw, who formerly had a window-cleaning business, sprays dead brown lawns with a “deep green water-based dye that makes that turf look good enough for a golf course or a professional football stadium.”

Clients include real estate agents selling foreclosures. The cost is $175 to $225 to do a yard.

Many Real Estate 2.0 websites allow visitors to comment and review real estate agents. Those reviews are displayed on the website for all to see and can even show up in search engine results. An obvious downside to online reviews are fakes from agents crowing about themselves or sand bagging the competition. But what if a fake review is really funny? Humor is frequently used in radio and television ads to push products. Is humor just as effective in an online review? The following review posted yesterday to IncredibleAgents.com sure worked on me:

(Warning: objectionable material ahead)

“My new home is novel-worthy. Larry is an elegant figure whose politeness and intelligibility shine like a glorious supernova in the dark night of smoggy Mordor-esque Houston. After losing my previous home and family in a freak gasoline fight accident, Larry walked me across the sea of my despair into a glorious heaven of warmth. Larry is always at my side, or behind me. Not only is Larry a great man, but he is of great lineage, spawned from the fertile seed of David Gimour and Lars Ulrich. He surfed with Jerry Garcia, and l****oed tornadoes with Pecos Bill. If only my legacy were size of Larry’s pinky toe, and if only my legs were as shiny as his extraordinary buttocks, I would start my own religion. One Realtor to rule them all, one realtor to bind them, one realtor to make me come, buy a house, inside him. Produced by Melvin Goldfarb Written by Kookie and or Crissy Taylor-Jenkins”

I have no doubt it’s a fake. But more importantly, it left me wondering if Larry wrote it himself. If so, I bet Larry’s a likable guy who I’d like to work with. Well done, Larry.

Q: The prices of U.S. homes fell by 3.2 percent in the second quarter, the steepest in 20 years. What do you think?

You’re probably thinking a snoozer, right? Wrong. PBS’ Paul Solman does the improbable by breaking down mortgage-backed securities and keeping the viewer engaged. This is the single best explanation of modern day mortgages I’ve ever seen or read. And honestly, I had never fully understood the inner workings of a mortgage-backed security until now. Excellent work, PBS.

Part One

Part Two

Clearing Title gives us an eyewitness account of the far-reaching effects of belt tightening in the mortgage industry. Everyone involved in a deal—real estate agents, loan officers, buyers, sellers, etc—is merely a bowling pin once a lender pulls the funding.

The following data was taken straight out of the Baron database. It compares the average time a home spends on the market (reported by our agents) versus the average final bid of listing auctions:

It’s quite simple when you think about it: the longer a home sits on the market, the more costs a Realtor incurs.

I’ve got a fantastic idea for a new Realtor product. I’ve never been more excited about the prospect for a new product than this one. If my assumptions are correct, this new product could dramatically change the way Realtors do business. However, my assumptions are just that…assumptions. So, if you are a real estate broker or agent, please consider helping me validate those assumptions by completing the following survey. It only has 7 questions and will likely take you less than 2 minutes to complete:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=9MpDZU5c16kiI6CjrmEN0w_3d_3d

If you’re a blogger whose audience includes brokers and agents, please consider linking to the survey. Be sure to leave a trackback in the comments if you’d like to preview the new product once the design is complete.

Thanks in advance for your participation!

Someone at Zillow let a feature announcement slip outside the corporate network tonight. It looks like Zillow is going after the neighborhood conversation, too.

Yahoo! Real Estate added two new online appraisal sources—Reply! and eppraisal.com—to their home value section this week. They join Zillow to form a home value estimates “trifecta” for consumers.

In my opinion, this is a big win for eppraisal.com. Just recently, eppraisal.com moved into the top 100 of real estate sites on the web according to Hitwise. Now, they will share “shelf space” with two competitors who each have millions in VC funding. Congratulations to Erik Hersman and his team over at Realty Thoughts on yet another victory.